Processing a silver halide color photographic material basically comprises two steps of color development (for a color reversal material, a black-and-white development precedes this), and desilvering, and the desilvering step comprises a bleaching step and a fixing step, or a monobath bleach-fixing step that may be used alone or in combination with a bleaching step and a fixing step. If necessary additional processing steps may be added, such as a washing step, a stopping step, a stabilizing step, and a pretreatment step for the acceleration of development.
In the color development step, silver halide that has been exposed to light is reduced to silver, and at the same time the oxidized primary amine color-developing agent reacts with a coupler to form a dye. In this process halide ions resulting from the decomposition of the silver halide dissolve into the developing solution and accumulate therein. On the other hand, the color-developing agent is consumed by the above-mentioned reaction with the coupler. Further, other components in the color developer will be held in the photographic material and carried over, so that the concentrations of components in the developing solution lower gradually. Therefore, in a development method that involves continuously processing a large amount of a silver halide photographic material by, for example, an automatic-developing processor, in order to avoid a change the in finished characteristics of the development due to a change in the concentrations of the components, a means of keeping the concentrations of the components of the color developer in certain ranges is required.
For instance, if the influence of the condensation of a component that will be consumed, such as developing agents and preservatives, is small, generally its concentration in the replenisher is previously made high in some cases a material that will elute and that has an effect of restraining development is contained in a lower concentration in a replenisher, or is not contained in the replenisher. In other cases a compound may be contained in a replenisher in order to remove the influence of a material that will elute. Further, in other cases, for example, the pH, the concentration of the alkali, or the concentration of a chelating agent is adjusted. As measures for them, generally a method of replenishing with replenishers is used that will supply insufficient components and dilute the increased components. The replenishment with the replenishers, however, necessarily results in a large amount of overflow, which has caused big problems concerning economics and the pollution.
In recent years, for the purpose of saving resources and lowering the pollution, it has been earnestly desired to reduce the replenishing amount of the color developer and also to make the developing process rapid. However, if the replenishing amount of a color developer is simply lowered, exudates from the photographic material, in particular bromide ions, which are a strong development restrainer, and organic compounds accumulate, resulting in a problem that lowers the development activity, retarding the speed of development.
To solve this problem a technique of accelerating the development is required, and many techniques for making the development rapid that enable the replenishing amount to be lowered have been studied. It is known as one of such techniques, for example, to increase the pH and the processing temperature of the color developer, thereby making the development rapid. However, that technique causes such serious problems as that fogging is high, the stability of the developing solution is lowered, and the fluctuation of the photographic characteristics in continuous processing increases. As another technique for the acceleration, the technique of adding various development accelerators is disclosed, but its effect has been inadequate and unsatisfactory.
For the purpose of lowering the accumulation of bromide ions, which are a strong development restrainer, thereby intending to make the development rapid, JP-A ("JP-A" means unexamined published Japanese patent application) Nos. 95345/1983, 232342/1984, and 70552/1986, and International Publication No. WO 04534/1987 disclose methods wherein silver halide photographic materials having high contents of silver chloride are used, and the methods are considered as effective means of lowering the replenishing amount of the developer without reducing the speed of the development. However, it was found that these methods were impractical because such new problems arose as that when the replenishing amount of the developer was lowered and the process was carried out continuously, although the speed of the development was not reduced, along with the continuous processing the photographic characteristics, in particular the minimum density, the maximum density, and the sensitivity of the magenta color layer formed, fluctuated conspicuously, and in addition, the image-lasting quality after the processing was deteriorated, and in particular the yellow stain increased considerably.
On the other hand, JP-A Nos. 30250/1987, 246054/1987, 249149/1987, and 257156/1987 describe methods of processing silver halide photographic materials that contain a pyrazoloazole magenta coupler having the formula (I) and that comprise silver chloride or silver chlorobromide, and according to the technique disclosed therein these methods enable processing to be carried out in a rapid manner, the maximum density of the magenta color formed layer is high, fogging is low, and the color reproduction quality is excellent. However, there is no disclosure therein related to continuous processing, much less a description concerning the problems discussed above, which problems arise when the replenishing amount of a developer is decreased considerably and concerning measures of solving such problems. Therefore from the disclosures one cannot infer the technique of the present invention.
At present, although the replenishing amount of a color developer varies a little depending on the photographic material to be developed, generally it is required that the replenishing amount is on the order of 180 to 1,000 ml per m.sup.2 of the photographic material to be processed. This is because if the replenishing amount is further lowered, while avoiding reduction of the speed of development, quite serious problems occur, that is, the photographic characteristics, in particular the maximum density, the minimum density, and the density of the magenta color layer formed, fluctuate greatly, the image-lasting quality after the processing is marred, and in particular the yellow stain increases, and no technique has been found that is able to solve these problems.